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strange_aeonsI still don't know Arunir's sister's name. For the time being I think I can get by calling her Eri, but (a) that's clearly part of a longer name, and (b) it's not her name.
For a long time elves (there have to be elves) were capable of passing for human, or at least more capable than they are now — even before the Cataclysmic Return of Magic they had slightly startling quantities of nipples and a tendency towards hormonal wonkiness and (as a more or less direct result of the preceding) intersexuality, which conditions are genetic, not supernatural, but they didn't have the pointy ears or the funny colors. And because they could pass for human, they did, but they were nonetheless fairly rabid about holding on to their culture. What they would do is give their children names in elvish, but also names appropriate to whatever culture it was they were passing in. Because the need to pass is mostly gone, and because it's pretty much impossible now anyway, this has mostly fallen out of practice.
But the twins' mother is human, and she and Sweeney did something I think I stole from Awhina: each of them gave both daughters a name appropriate to their respective naming traditions. Arunir goes by the name Sweeney gave her; Eri goes by the name her mother gave her.
I don't know what name Eri's mother gave her.
Partly this is because I don't know if Eri's mother would have given her an Indonesian or an Arabic or, hell, even a Dutch name. The suspicion that the name is Arabic, and that Eri's mother is Muslim, is growing on me; this is partly because I like the sproinkness of Eri, who is quite visibly Asian (once one gets past her also being quite visibly not human), having a name that is quite visibly not, and partly because it gives some clue as to the twins' point of origin even before I come right out and say it, assuming a reader who knows from Indonesia.
And because the character I named 'Mohammed' wound up saddled with a version of the name so corrupted it sounds French. He's dead before the book starts, anyway. This thing is turning out fairly Islam-positive (where to other religions it seems merely indifferent), for reasons I hope I'll learn later, because I have no idea why at the moment. Actually, I need to do some research into that business with the meteorite, but am a little afraid to do so, having no library access and some prior experience with the type and quantity of propaganda one tends to encounter when one researches anything even remotely involving an ideology online.
For a long time elves (there have to be elves) were capable of passing for human, or at least more capable than they are now — even before the Cataclysmic Return of Magic they had slightly startling quantities of nipples and a tendency towards hormonal wonkiness and (as a more or less direct result of the preceding) intersexuality, which conditions are genetic, not supernatural, but they didn't have the pointy ears or the funny colors. And because they could pass for human, they did, but they were nonetheless fairly rabid about holding on to their culture. What they would do is give their children names in elvish, but also names appropriate to whatever culture it was they were passing in. Because the need to pass is mostly gone, and because it's pretty much impossible now anyway, this has mostly fallen out of practice.
But the twins' mother is human, and she and Sweeney did something I think I stole from Awhina: each of them gave both daughters a name appropriate to their respective naming traditions. Arunir goes by the name Sweeney gave her; Eri goes by the name her mother gave her.
I don't know what name Eri's mother gave her.
Partly this is because I don't know if Eri's mother would have given her an Indonesian or an Arabic or, hell, even a Dutch name. The suspicion that the name is Arabic, and that Eri's mother is Muslim, is growing on me; this is partly because I like the sproinkness of Eri, who is quite visibly Asian (once one gets past her also being quite visibly not human), having a name that is quite visibly not, and partly because it gives some clue as to the twins' point of origin even before I come right out and say it, assuming a reader who knows from Indonesia.
And because the character I named 'Mohammed' wound up saddled with a version of the name so corrupted it sounds French. He's dead before the book starts, anyway. This thing is turning out fairly Islam-positive (where to other religions it seems merely indifferent), for reasons I hope I'll learn later, because I have no idea why at the moment. Actually, I need to do some research into that business with the meteorite, but am a little afraid to do so, having no library access and some prior experience with the type and quantity of propaganda one tends to encounter when one researches anything even remotely involving an ideology online.
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Date: 2002-06-28 01:56 pm (UTC)She's now Q're -- a name which amuses me greatly with its apostrophe, and also because it's the name of the maiden part of one of those maiden/mother/crone goddess triumvirates, which was worshipped by pre-Islamic Arabs and later became the daughters of Allah. (All right, I have an obtuse sense of humor, what of it?) Q're (also Qure) almost certainly has something to do with Kore, maiden to Demeter's mother and Hecate's crone, which is just a random fact I thought I'd toss in here to sweeten the pot.
I also picked up some useful information about that business with the meteorite and found some funny anti-UCLA propaganda, so it's all good.